Of Paper Airplanes and Astronomy Towers
by Irina
Summary: A cute little ficlet. Ginny needs help with a class project, and Harry is the only one around. Paper airplanes, crazy watches, butterbeer, and the Astronomy Tower - how can you go wrong?


Of Paper Airplanes and Astronomy Towers

An H/G ficlet by Irina

Harry's back hunched over under the weight of his bag.  He'd just spent several hours in the library, cramming for end-of-the-year exams.  He had no idea how he would ever pass, and Hermione's face swam before his eyes.  "You should've started studying two months ago," she admonished him.

"I know," Harry mumbled, then thought of how strange he would seem to anyone happening by, talking to someone who wasn't there.

From a nearby corridor, he heard voices, one apologetic, one raised in anger.  He ducked his head down and kept walking, hoping to pass this argument unnoticed, but it was not to be.  He _recognized_ the angry voice: it belonged to Ginny Weasley, Gryffindor Keeper and little sister to his best friend.  If anyone were bothering her, Harry would have to put a stop to it.  Sighing, and doing his best to stand up straight under the weight of his books, he turned down the side-passage.

Ginny stood, face red, eyes flashing, glaring at Seamus Finnigan.  "I'm really sorry, Gin," Seamus said.

"You _promised_!" she exclaimed.

"I _would_ help, you know I would, if Snape hadn't given me detention.  It's not my fault."

"What am I supposed to do now?" cried Ginny.

"It's not as though I did it on purpose," Seamus wheedled.  "Can't we put it off until tomorrow night?  It's only Divination and DADA.  I'm not going to get into trouble in either of those."

Ginny rolled her eyes.  "I have _Arithmancy_ and _Charms_ tomorrow.  This has to be done _now_."

He shrugged.  "Then I don't know what to tell you, Gin.  I'm really sorry."  And, with that, he took off down the hall towards the dungeons.

"_Aaargh_!"  Ginny made a sound that was half angry scream, half frustrated groan.

Harry stood still, unsure whether he should say anything.  He was about to slip away, when she looked up and spotted him.  "Hello?" Ginny called.  "Who's there?"

He stepped a little closer.  "It's Harry.  I'm sorry; I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but I was just walking by….  I'll just go, shall I?"

Ginny sighed.  "Sure.  Just go."

Harry hesitated.  She looked really upset.  "Um…is there anything wrong?"

She gave a bitter laugh.  "Wrong?  You could say that.  I've been working for _ages_ on the calculations and spells for this proposal, and I have to turn it in _tomorrow_, and what does Seamus do but blow up his cauldron the night before it's due…"  She looked like she was about to cry.

Ginny seemed so upset, before he could think better of it, Harry asked, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

In that moment, her entire face transformed.  Her lips curved up in a hopeful smile and her eyes lost their momentary dampness as she asked, "Really?  You'd help me?"

"Well," Harry said, immediately having second thoughts, "not if it's anything too complicated.  I'm only average at Charms, and I've never had Arithmancy.  What are you doing?"

"It's a proposal for a sixth year independent study," Ginny explained.  "I've spent ages working out how I'd manage it all, and if I don't have a successful test tonight, the whole project is scrapped.  Flitwick and Montague won't sponsor me for next year unless I can prove I know what I'm doing."

This was more complicated than he'd thought.  "What _are_ you doing, exactly?"

Ginny grinned.  "I'm building a broom."

Harry wasn't sure he'd heard correctly.  "You're…_building_ a –"

"Well," she interrupted, "not exactly.  I mean, I'll buy the broom in Hogsmeade, but it'll be the plain, non-magic kind.  I'm going to make it fly, though.  It's a complicated sort of thing; Arithmancy to figure out stuff like speed and aerodynamics, and charms to actually make it go.  Tonight is just a test, though, to see if the idea has potential.  I made a whole mess of these," she reached into her bag and pulled out a piece of folded paper, "enchanted with rough copies of the charms I found in the library."

Harry fought the urge to laugh.  "Gin, is that a –"

"Paper airplane," she interrupted.  "It's a paper model of a Muggle machine.  They sit inside, and it flies –"

"I know what an airplane is," Harry cut in.

"Oh."  A faint blush tinged her cheeks, but she talked on, "Have you ever ridden in one?  They would be fascinating.  My dad wanted to take us all on holiday in an airplane, but it was a _lot_ of money.  I think it would've been –"  All at once, Ginny seemed to remember exactly _whom_ she was speaking to.  She shut her mouth with a snap, and her blush intensified.

Harry sighed inwardly.  And she'd been doing so well…  Sometimes Ginny could go an entire ten or fifteen minutes before remembering that she was shy around him.  One of these days, she might even forget all together.  He rather liked talking to her, when she was actually talking.  She was the only person who didn't look at him as though he had a target on his forehead rather than a scar.  Even Ron and Hermione had a hard time forgetting that Voldemort was after him, but with Ginny, it never seemed to be an issue.  "The Dursleys always left me with Mrs. Figg," he said to fill the silence.  "I haven't ever been in an airplane.  It looks like an interesting project, though.  What do you need me to do?"

She cleared her throat and forced herself to speak.  She _needed_ to get this project done, and to do that, she needed Harry's help.  She'd just have to keep her chin up and ignore…well, ignore everything.  "Do you know anything about spells to measure speed?  That's what Seamus was going to help with.  And I need someone to run the stopwatch too.  I'll be busy keeping the flying charms in order.  Flitwick said that if I could get something to fly for fifteen seconds at half a meter per second, he'd sign off on my project."

She took off her watch and handed it to him.  It was a traditional Wizarding timepiece with seven hands, one in each color of the rainbow, whirling around.  "Which one counts seconds?" Harry asked, confused.

"The orange.  Can you help?"

Harry nodded.  "Of course.  I don't know much about velocity charms, but between the two of us, we should figure it out.  Where are we going to do this?  The Astronomy Tower might be the best place; it's the highest point in the school."  As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Harry froze.  Had he just suggested going to the Astronomy Tower with a _girl_?  Oh, God, this was embarrassing.

Ginny's breath caught in her throat.  Had he just suggested they go to the _Astronomy Tower_?  Okay.  She could do this.  All she had to do was focus.  "Good idea."  Ginny cringed inwardly.  She'd tried to sound nonchalant, but the words came out more like a squeak.  Not at all what she was going for.

Harry smiled to put her at ease, and adjusted his bag.  "Shall we, then?"

Not trusting her voice, Ginny nodded and picked up her bag of airplanes and scroll of calculations.

*          *          *          *          *

They stood at the window, watching the seventh plane plummet to the earth.  "This isn't going to work," Ginny said.

"You've worked so hard on the calculations," Harry protested.  "You can't just quit.  Here," he picked her scroll up from the floor, "look over them again.  Is there anything you might have missed?"  She had the same frustrated look Hermione often wore when faced with a difficult academic problem.

Ginny ran her quill over a few lines then sat, silent, for a long time.  Harry was quiet and let her think.  Finally, she jumped to her feet and said, "Here.  Let me try this."  She took the airplane from his hands, and bent over it with her wand.  She was so occupied with her work; she didn't even seem to note the jolt of electricity when their fingers brushed.  It must have just been him, then.

The setting sun streaked through the tall windows of the tower, lighting the room with red-gold fire almost the same color as her hair.  Harry tried to ignore the observation.  He shouldn't be looking at Ginny Weasley's hair.  That was a bad idea if there ever was one.  He briefly tried to imagine what a date between them would be: she'd sit there, silent and blushing.  It would be terrible.  Or…she'd tell him funny stories about growing up at the Burrow, playing Quidditch, and her classes, and make him forget about the growing threat of Voldemort, about Sirius and Lupin, his only connections to his parents, risking their lives on dangerous missions, about Cedric, lying dead in the graveyard.  Okay, he _had_ to stop thinking this way.  Nothing was going to come of it.

"I think I've figured it out," she said, too occupied in her project to remember to be shy.

"They say eighth time's the charm," Harry quipped.

Ginny grinned at him.  "Who says that?"

"_They_ do," he replied.  "I just said so.  Weren't you listening?"

"Check the velocity charm," she ordered, tossing the airplane through the air.  It glided past him and, conditioned by Quidditch, Harry snatched it out of the air.  He gave it a once-over with his wand and pronounced, "It's good."  The paper would turn red when the airplane hit her desired speed.

"All right then," Ginny said.  "Let's see if _they're_ right.  Eighth time's the charm."

They stood together at the window, and Harry gently lofted it into the air.  They waited in suspense for the plane to change color.  The white paper tinged with blue, then transmuted to green, yellow, orange, and finally red.  "Go," Ginny ordered.

Harry began ticking seconds off on her watch.   "Seven," his voice intoned, "eight, nine…"

At eleven, Ginny grabbed his hand.  Harry didn't think she realized what she was doing.  Her entire body was tense, and she was holding her breath, wide eyes trained on her airplane.  He closed his fingers around hers and gave a reassuring squeeze, but she didn't let go.

She spoke the last few numbers with him.  "Fourteen, _fifteen_!  I did it!"  She beamed with genuine pride.  "I didn't think it would work!  Thanks so much for your help!"  Before she realized what she was doing, Ginny had thrown her arms around his neck.  A split second later, she pulled back, very red in the face.  What had possessed her to do _that_?  He must think she was a complete idiot.

For once, Harry couldn't feel uncomfortable at her blush, as he was sure his cheeks were just as pink.  "Ginny –" he began.

"Harry –" she said at the same time.  They both laughed nervously.  "You first," she said, busying herself with rolling up her scroll so she wouldn't have to look at him.

"No," Harry said, "that's okay.  You first."

Ginny studied a spot somewhere off to his left as she tucked her papers into her bag.  "I was just wondering if you had plans for the next Hogsmeade weekend.  If you do, I understand, but I thought –"

"I don't have plans," he interrupted.

Ginny forced the words out of her mouth.  She had to say this fast, or she'd lose her nerve.  "Then, um, can I buy you a Butterbeer?  As a thank you for your help?  I never would've figured out the speed charm by myself.  It's sixth level magic."

Harry smiled.  "Sure.  That sounds like fun.  Do you want to meet there?"

She grinned and finally met his eyes, even though her cheeks were still bright red.  "That would be great.  What were you going to say?"

Harry cleared his throat.  "Actually, I was going to ask you the same thing, if I could get you a Butterbeer to celebrate your success."  He prayed that she wouldn't clam up.  He didn't know how he'd ever sustain a conversation after making an admission like that.

He shouldn't have worried.  Ginny beamed.  "I'd love to."

He smiled back.  "Great.  Next weekend, then."  He'd make sure Hermione was the first to know.  She'd be a good buffer if Ron decided to take a fit over this.

Harry and Ginny left the Astronomy Tower together.  On the stairs, their hands brushed and once again, Harry closed his fingers around hers.


End file.
